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Mac OS X 10.2 "Jaguar" Reviews Pour In
hype7 writes "The reviews on Apple's new Mac OS X 10.2 "Jaguar" are starting to come through. The New York Times (free reg required) heaps on the praise: 'Mac OS X 10.2 is the best-looking, least-intrusive and most thoughtfully designed operating system walking the earth today.' MacCentral is positive: 'From what I've seen Jaguar is leaps and bounds ahead of Mac OS X 10.1 in both speed and functionality.' MacWorld has also chimed in: 'for most users, there are a lot of important improvements in this upgrade: performance boosts, improved printing, and interface enhancements will be immediate benefits. And over time, Mac OS X 10.2's new technologies (including Quartz Extreme and Rendezvous) will make the update even more valuable.'"
Too bad Apple isn't giving a discount to current users of OS X, with the exception of recent OS X purchasers. $129 is a bit pricey for an OS upgrade.
At least the reviews make a point of that.
Awww...c'mon...you don't have fun w/the registrations?
To the Post, I'm a 101-year-old woman, living in the 20001 zip code who reads lots of tech articles and the Boondocks. Who knew that demographic liked the Boondocks?
It's been shipping with new Macs for the past week or so. My copy was shipped from Apple yesterday, I might be getting it a day early as well.
I tried every decent and legal way I could think of to resolve the issue w/the business before I rented the chicken suit
command line apps seem very much slower
alot of people say that the abi has changed because of the change to GCC 3.x but they should not work because of the ABI change not slower whats up ?
regards
John Jones
Just FYI, Macworld ownd Maccentral and thus anything coming out of Maccentral will be a parrot of what's coming out of Macworld.
Not to say that's wrong, just saying that you might have well only mentioned one of the other and picked a different 3rd example.
--Won't that be grand? Computers and the programs will start thinking and the people will stop. - Dr. Walter Gibbs
You heard it here. It's called the "family license".
It feels a lot snappier. I've installed it on a blue&white G3/300, and even without the boost from Quartz Extreme (which requires AGP and Radeon/GeForce or better) the GUI has picked up speed. The Finder is MUCH faster at handling windows with a lot of files and no longer feels like it's asleep at the wheel.
Maybe OS X will be usable below the Dual GHz G4 level after all. The next thing to try will be iPhoto, which was ridiculously slow on my 500 MHz iBook.
Just thought it would be interesting to note that Apple is selling "site" licences for home users as what it calls the Mac OS X Family Pack.
Just thought it was neat. Bummed that there was no upgrade price, many users were only going to purchase one box of Mac OS X 10.2 and load it on all thier home machines. Now you can legally upgrade all your home machines, for a much more resonable amount, and Apple gets $199 instead of $129
been said so many times
x86 lots of hardware (hard to support)
x86 vesa is stupid
darwin the Mach based OS that apple uses as the base has a port to x86 but only a limited amount of hardware is supported
if your intrested Code it
regards
John Jones
I once shot a man who posted too many, "Imagine a beowulf cluster of these"
I'm not an american resident, so the only zip code I know is 90210. I suspect that anyone asking for zipcodes gets a heck of a lot of people answering that.
OSX onto x86 would be like putting the body of a Jaguar (no pun intended) on the guts of a Yugo. Sure you could do it, but why bother?
seSales, Point of Sale software for OS X.
Gotta watch those quotation marks!
I'm sorry, what's that you say?
Couldn't hear you.
El riesgo vive siempre!
So the name bothers you? look at the new features, here are a few I am excited about:
Quartz anti-aliasing for Carbon apps
Unicode character palette
Mount ftp servers directly in Finder
iChat
improved Address Book
Sherlock 3
Rendezvous
Quartz Extreme
Inkwell
better interopability with windows networks
IPv6
--
Don't sweat the petty things, and don't pet the sweaty things.
A lot of people have been saying this lately, there's even been an april fools joke about it. The fact is that it would probably take apple only a few months to port osx to x86. Why won't they? Look how osx runs on a mac...it's flawless, you don't need to worry about device drivers for the most part, the install process only asks you what languages you want. Apple wants the end users to realize that all the crap involved with computers isn't necessary, you should only have to plug it in to get it to do what you want.
If you're worried about losing control of your OS, please take a nice long look at Microsoft, a company that sells very little hardware (and outsources every piece of hardware it does sell, including the X-Box) but is one of the richest and most successful companies in the history of mankind, based solely on OS sales.
Yeah, based on OS sales to hardware makers. If Apple can figure out how to get OSX pre-installed on PC hardware, they'd be rich. They'd be Microsoft in fact, since that's all Microsoft had before they got where they are now.
For now, if Apple makes the OS run on x86 hardware, they don't gain much. In fact they might lose some hardware sales.
RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!! The Macs have become self-aware and created legs to run around and reak havok!
The old NeXT operating system was very nice and had many of the same features that OSX does (not suprising since OSX, if memory servces, is based partially on NeXT). But NeXT didn't get out of the hardware market quickly enough and support hardware choice with enough earnest and IMO ended up falling as a result.
Being a die-hard Linux/Unix advocate I am starting to warm up to OSX from what I've been reading but I will absolutely not give it a second look until there are more vendors that are building hardware for it than just Apple. I use Unix/Linux partially for OS/hardware freedom of choice, I am not about to go to a platform that gives me little lattitude in either dimension!
Considering that most of Apple's income comes from the sale of hardware, your suggestion makes as much sense as telling Bill Gates to concentrate on selling applications and stop mucking about with that silly Windows stuff.
Yup. Samba.
Also NFS.
Also WebDAV.
Also has a PPTP-based VPN client.
Also has "Active Directory" compatibility, whatever that is (some Windows stuff).
And some other stuff you may have heard of, like RPC, FTP, HTTP, OpenSSH, usw.
Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachtani?
www.fogbound.net
Mac OS 10 is showing us how a good operating system is designed. That's useful so that Windows users can compare and understand better what they are getting.
Another thing worth pointing out is that you can get 10.2 for only $69.95 if you're a K-12 faculty/staff member or Higher Ed faculty/staff/student member. The discount isn't directly offered to K-12 students. Through a school you can usually get a discount. Apple Specialists would probably also give you a discount for your daughter's computer. Since I work at a Unv and K-12 I bought mine for $69.95.
I hear MacOS X is great and all, but am I the only one who hears "Jaguar" and thinks not "lithe jungle cat" but instead "pretty but unreliable British automobile"?
...What no one is mentioning is that yes the OS is amazing (worth the high price of a Mac IMO) but the Dev tools are simply fantastic. If your a pro you get all these amazing dev tools for free and if your a beginner now you have a reason to start.
The Cocoa framework is, once you understand it, the easiest, most powerful framework there is. You can make amazing, truely object oriented programs with a full GUI in no time t all. Objective C is a great language and the fact you CAN use all your C/C++ code in your programs and integrate things adds to the functionality.
There is an object called NSTask that allows you, the programmer in code, access and use the function of ANY command line tool in your program. Who else offers something like this?
I really suggest to all developers to take a good look at developing for this computer. It's fun, effeciant and powerful. Not to mention free and of course you have all your favorite command line tools, compilers etc. In fact, every program compiled with the free compiler is GCC.
It's simply, great.
Native Java also =)
"Allez Cusine!"
Has it not occoured to you that the reason that Mac OS X is so stable and fast is because they know exactly what hardware it will need to run?
I've read many comments here saying how Apple should port the OS if it's so good. But one of the reasons the OS is good is that they don't have to worry that someone will try to run it on an Althalon, or put in there $0.99 NIC and expect it to work. Just ask the Linux community and they'll tell you the bigest headache is getting drivers for all of the hardware that is out there.
So maybe we should think about this in the future. If every hardware vendor had the same quality control as Apple, and was as methodical about testing that everything works together we'd all have an OS that works as well as OS X, no matter what it was.
Trust me if Apple ported there OS to the x86 people would be screaming from day one that it sucks. They'd probably blame Apple for doing it on purpose to get people to buy Macs.
I'm starting to dread when Apple news makes the slashdot front page. That is when 3/4 of the discussion tends to be about multi-button mice, "proprietary hardware" and how we don't want to pay for it, stuipid misunderstsandings about the OS, and on and on and on.
I almost prefer the apple.slashdot.org ghetto that we're usually relegated to. At least there it's about 3/4 people who actually understand something about the platform and don't need to bring the discussion back to "why I don't like this platform" no matter what the original story is.
You like your Macintosh better than me, don't you Dave? Dave? Can you hear me Dave?
I'm Switching(TM) in a few weeks. Can't wait to brag about having BSD as my main kernel (with a Suse/AMD box on the sidelines).
:)
Now, having gotten that out of the way. OS 10.2 is nice. Speed improvement is striking. Not in the way that, "it should have been that fast in the first place", it's more in the way of the first time I installed BeOS on a computer to see it in comparision to WinME.
Networking is definitely faster. I haven't benched anything yet, but I can say if you have a fast line, you will see your web browser of choice speed up considerably.
The "disconnect from Network bug" is still there. Connect to a SMB, AppleTalk, or DAV volume and pull your network cord (or turn off the machine exporting the drive) and you will get the spinning wheel of death.
Video Performance is spooky, even on an origional G4 tower. You really have to see it to understand.
iChat is next to useless, but the auto discovery of other clients is nice.
SMB export was a pain in the ass. You have to enable it on a user by user basis, which wasn't obvious, in the Accounts preference pane. Then after it's enabled for a user, you have change their password. Since the GUI client changes both the Samba password and Unix password for the user, at the same time, the users CANNOT just change their password on the command line. This also raises fears that the Samba passwords are stored in cleartext on the harddrive. I suspect, this is not the case, but haven't look yet. There is no convient way to set the SMB workgroup in the GUI
XDarwin needed to be repaired (which is available at the X on X site and seemingly not part of what Fink compiles) to work. This was annoying.
The firewall has Gnutella as an option to allow.
My SCSI CD Burner stopped working. I suspect the old SCSI bug is back for the time being.
Some other shit I foget....
Burn Hollywood Burn
I think they did look at Microsoft, and what MS could and would do to them if they raised such a challenge.
Office would certainly die, probably IE as well.
Tight integration of hardware and software is a big part of the Mac experience. It avoids problems. MacOS x86 would have tons of problems, many more than windows, more, probably, than Linux, which is known for having driver problems.
I was about to write that most Mac people have never thought about a driver in their lives, but that's probably an exaggeration. They have to worry about them for scanners and stuff like that. But not for the core components of the system. Stuff just works. Which is, of course, the basis of their ad campaign.
Apple makes a profit on their hardware, because their model shields them from direct competition. The tight integration is a core component of their OS. And moving into x86 OS's would trigger an all out war from MS, and pull the plug on software that every Mac OS X user uses all day every day (IE).
Many people are commenting that Apple needs to move to x86, however, I think there are a few problems with that. First of all, Apple has never strictly enforced the licensing systems they have in place. Nearly all Mac users I've dealt with are lax about it too, usually installing the copy they get with their new computer on their older equipment, or borrowing a copy from a friend. There has never been much pressure from anywhere not to do this, because, after all, "everyone knows that Apple survives off hardware". As Apple has no copy protection scheme in place, they are worried that they would loose massive amounts of money by just selling an OS to a crowd which has always viewed the OS as a freebie.
Apple could avoid this by creating their own bios, or some other way of restricting the machines that could install Mac OS X for the x86, but historically, this hasn't worked well, just look at IBM. In the Mac world though, they have been able to hold patents and such on far more of the machine, preventing against unlicensed clones (they prosecuted quite a few companies in the '80s over Mac clones). If they don't have complete control over the hardware, its doubtful that they could prevent clones.
Finally, if we assume that Apple decides to release an OS X port that works on all x86 hardware, they would have to compete with all the x86 vendors on price (Dell, etc.), as well as Microsoft on the OS (and all the OEM agreements that entails), and they would have to set up support for a huge amount of hardware that they don't have experience. This seems unlikely to me.
As a combination of all these issues, I just cannot see Apple moving to x86 any time soon. Sure, they might be able to do it, but I don't see it making sense.
With respect, I just went through this with another Apple guy who just wouldn't listen to reason. If you look at identical applications on both platforms, a G4 is about 20% faster clock-for-clock as a P4, on the average. In some cases, it's more, and in some cases it's less, but on the average that's it. When you compare prices (I used Dell), it's about 2x on the low end, and 4x on the high end.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Here's a link to the info you are looking for: http://www.apple.com/macosx/jaguar/compatibility.h tml
--
Don't sweat the petty things, and don't pet the sweaty things.
Actually, I would consider the proprietary hardware to be one of their advantages.
Having a standard platform to work with may be why Apple's work is so impressive. With like hardware across the field to work with, OS X software developers don't have to worry about hardware driver interaction issues nearly as much as on a x86 platform.
It's also an obvious advantage in stability areas, where Windows is so completely flawed...since it has to be compatible with such a wide range of hardware.
As much as I'd love to see OS X for x86, I don't it will ever happen. Apple likes having complete control over their products so they can produce the best products. With a few exceptions, Apple arguably releases the highest quality and designed products in the computer industry, and I think that's a real advantage for them.
-brain
Steve Jobs: Hey, Mike, whassup?
Michael Dell: Drinking, a Bud, hoping like hell that the SEC doesn't decide that I'm next.
Steve Jobs: Anyway, what do you think of MacOS on Dell Hardware?
Michael Dell: It'd be a pain in the ass, Steve. Bill's got my nuts in a pair of vice-grips. I'm trying to break loose, but if I make any moves at all, I start paying Microsoft through the nose. I've made a few deals to ship OS-less PC's with Freedos media in the box, but I'm not sure how that's going to work yet.
Steve Jobs: Well, let me give you an offer like this. Supposing you do manage to start selling PC's without Windows successfully. How about you make us a promise to ship a certain volume of PC's with Mac0SX for x86 along with a copy of Virtual PC or something similiar so your users don't lose out on all thier Windows Apps. It should cost about the same as a Windows XP license, if you don't include the cost of the Windows license they have to buy to get Virtual PC to work.
Michael Dell: I'll do you one better. I understand there are some guys out there who've done a really good job with the Wine project for Linux. Crossover, or something like that. I bet with a small infusion of cash, they could get a version ready for OSX in just a few months.
Steve Jobs: Is it any good?
Michael Dell: It plays Warcraft 3.
Steve Jobs: Hmmm...
Michael Dell: Hmmm...
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
Why is this insightful? "x86 components have proven that they don't 'just work'" . WTF, this has NO validity behind it. Look inside your mac, almost all the components you'll see were brought from x86 or other systems with the CPU being the obvious exception. And hell, with the massive speed gap you have between the highend G4's (what, 1GHz top?) and high-end P4's (what, 2.8GHz now?) the x86 platform is clearly superior in terms of speed.
The first release of OS X didn't, and the one stinkin mac in the company couldn't talk to one of our windows NT servers running Mac file services! Why you ask? Because NT only supports Mac file sharing via appletalk not TCP/IP (as do all older mac servers). Does OS 10.2 finally support file sharing via appletalk?
If so, it may actually be time to get the one mac user off of OS 9.
-ted
The minute that Apple starts making software to run on commodity X86 boxes is the minute that Microsoft reaches out and crushes them permanently.
I _like_ Apple hardware. It just works. My video card works with my motherboard works with my sound card. Right out of the box. With no weird IRQ conflicts, or other baggage associated with a broken 20 year old design.
I think "ahead of it's time, kick-ass, console gaming system from Atari that no one bought, forcing Atari out of the hardware business", but that's just me.
My iBook was actually the cheapest notebook available with all of the features I wanted. iBook: $1,800. Closest x86 alternative (Sony Vaio): $2300. And considering all of the features, the iMacs are very fairly priced.
Bear in mind that there are other things beside CPU speed, especially with laptops. I wanted a 32MB Radeon 7500, when most x86 laptops have 8MB GeForce2 MXs or ATI Rages. I also wanted to be able to plug the thing into any TV without a converter. My iBook does that with a $19 connector; the x86 ones I looked at need a $100 VGA-to-TV converter.
If you're stuck on meaningless numbers (like, oh, I dunno, clock speed) then sure, it looks like a raw deal. But when you look at it from a feature and usability standpoint Apple computers blow away the competition.
Just can't get Atari out of my head? Y would Apple port OS-X to the Jag? O! I C!
"None of this shit works" -W.Shatner
Actually if it ran on x86. I'd stand in line to spend $200 to be one of the first to buy it.
I have $200 to spend, on OSX no problem. Its the $1700 for hardware that I don't have. Yes, I know Macs can be bought for less, but the one I would buy is $1700.
here
No, the British don't build computers, they couldn't find a way to make them leak oil.
I ordered the Family licence, but got my hands on the 10.2 upgrade CDs in my 17" iMac.
So I installed on the older hardware around the house.
Beige G3 with Radeon/466MHz G3/Firewire
iMac DV 400 MHz
Powerbook G3 400MHz
The Beige G3 is really snappy. Bootup is down to about 25 seconds from when the chime starts to when the Dock shows up. Everything about it is fast, fast and stable.
iMac and Powerbook are also very snappy. Finder draws when a large folder on a remote drive open are as fast as they are in 9.2.2.
My Beige G3 would hang about one every two days when I monkeyed with Firewire, no longer.
10.2 on my PowerBook G4 550 is really fast. Only problem is that I can't get Dave to uninstall.
Worth the $200 for 5 or $129 for a single.
I'll bite.
Yes, I know this subject has been beaten into the ground ad-infinitum, but it still needs to be said once again: DUMP THE PROPRIETARY HARDWARE.
Apple uses off-the-shelf hard drives, optical drives, RAM, and graphics cards. The only proprietary pieces of hardware are their motherboards and cases.
Apple is selling hardware that is half the speed at 2 to 4 times the price of Intel hardware. Yes, apparently there are enough hard-core fanatics to keep the company alive, but why be satisfied with that? Why sit arrogantly back and just preach to those people?
Half the speed, only if you count Megahertz. Mac OS X comes with lots of software which runs faster than any comparable software in the Intel world, such as their G4-optimized MP3 encoder, which can encode high-quality 160kpbs MP3s at 10x real-time on a 733 MHz G4, directly from a CD. Your P4 may be running at 2+ GHz, but since there are currently no MP3 encoders that are optimized for the P4 architecture, your MP3 encoder is slower. Also, Mac OS X takes advantage of your graphics card for all of its drawing now - something that neither Windows or Linux does. This frees up the Mac's poor MHz-starved processors to do other things.
2 to 4 times the price? What are you smoking? The only way you can get a PC for half the price of a similarly-equipped Mac is by using dirt-cheap components that only work half the time. If you want poor-quality or mediocre hardware, you can get a cheaper PC. If you really want good hardware, a Mac is usually priced about the same, or maybe 10-20% more. (Mac laptops are often a better deal than similarly equipped PC laptops; desktop Macs are usually 10-20% more expensive.)
Yes, I know that Apple is traditionally a hardware company. So what? Being a software company hasn't exactly hurt Microsoft. Software is HUGELY more profitable than hardware.
Ha! Apple has at least twice the profit margins as Dell. They make plenty of money on hardware.
Unfortunately, as long as Microsoft has all of the major computer manufacturers in their back pocket, all major brand-name PCs will come with Windows preinstalled. Nobody has a chance of competing with that.
And besides, what's stopping them from "doing Intel right" and coming out with their own line of expensive hardware? Oh, no one will buy it because it will be so much more expensive? Well, some fanatics will continue to buy it, and meanwhile they continue to make huge $$$ on the software.
The main problem with Mac OS X running on ALL Intel hardware is drivers. Unless you're going to talk all peripheral manufacturers into writing Mac OS X drivers, there'd be no point.
As much as I despise Apple-the-company, I would LOVE to have a real competitor to Microsoft on the desktop, particularly one that was Unix based.
If you're unwilling to buy Apple's hardware, you'd better put your money behind your favorite Linux distro, then. Apple makes a great hardware/software combination and they have no reason to start running on PCs.
I really wish Steve would pull his head out of his ass and stop being satisfied being a boutique.
Yeah, wouldn't it be cool if Apple started advertising to Windows users, letting them know how Mac OS X is fast, stable, practical, and "just works"? Oh wait...
Yeah, I even knew that, it's just not my first association.
2) Universal Access -- So what if you got all your eyeballs, ears and arms, doesn't mean you can't take advantage of the amazing Universal Access controls in Mac OS X. Apple's Text to Speech technology rules. Now my Mac talks to me when certain events occur, "Mutha Fucka! E-Mail Server Down!", "Some asshole is NMAPn' me!!!". I can also hilight text and have the Mac read it to me with a simple keystroke.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
Ummmmm i can tell you have no education with computer hardware. Because one of the most basic classes you would take would have taught you that clock speed is not the end all be all of how fast your computer will work.
Ummmmmmmm why don't you read WHAT I WROTE. Note the "20% faster clock-for-clock on the average" phrase. Before you criticize me, at least learn to read.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
First David Pogue (NY Times) is biased towards the Mac for the most part.
I love Macs and want 10.2 to be great and successful and change the world, but this is such a fantastic understatement considering that David Pogue wrote the best selling O'Reilly "Missing Manual" for OS X.
BTW, according to Tim O'Reilly, Pogue's Missing Manual on OS X was "the #1 bestselling computer book at Amazon, Borders, and Barnes & Noble for most of 2002"!
It seems that KDE and GNOME just keep chasing Windows, especially Miguel (Windows done right (Is that even possible?)) Icaza.
Maybe the wrong target is being chased. Maybe the sights are set too low. Maybe Be or Mac would be a better desktop target.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
So why doesn't Linux and Windows have this sort of feature? I would love to see Gnome or KDE rendering everything using my GPU, so that my CPU could do something more interesting.
Is there any way to run OS X on an emulator under Linux? I've thought about porting some of my software to OS X, but I'm not ready to give up precious desk space to yet another box just yet. But being able to run OS X in an VMware-esque environment would be perfect. Any solutions out there for doing that yet?
Quartz freaking extreme.
Imagine - a OS who's GUI is being handled by the graphics card...
what an idea!
QE makes Mac OS X feel like Mac OS 9 - except that you get vector graphics everywhere.
Resizeing the whole screen, watching DVD's thru a translucent window, and drop down menus no longer drag your computer to a halt. - so long as you have a 16 meg Radeon or nVidia video card.
For users of older machines - you'll still like the performance enhancements, plus the longer battery life.
10.2 is worth every dime.
guns kill people like spoons make Rosie O'Donnell fat.
I'm talking about command line apps for 10.1 that actually compute and output is min e.g. SETI command line compiled for 10.1
regards
John Jones
Beyond that, know what? If your goal is to run mySQL and PHP as cheaply as possible, you want to be using Linux on a homemade Athlon box. Just like if your primary concern is games, you should use Windows. This isn't about telling every last user in the world to use the same OS.
On the other hand, there are web design and software development apps available for MacOS that make anything on Linux (except maybe KDevelop) look sick. The bundled developer tools alone (Project Builder and Interface Builder) are terrific. You may want to check those out and see if they're a reason to make OS X your primary developer platform.Oh, and if you want a Unix laptop, Apple is clearly the answer, whether you want to use MacOS or Linux.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
I have a Windows box with an OK printer. I'd like to be able to print to it from the mac using the normal printer-sharing thing that Windows does. (If it's not clear already, I don't print very often, and am clearly not an expert in the configuration of printing)
As far as I can tell, this isn't possible using Mac OS 10.1; is it possible using Jagwire?
Also, is there any other way to get printing from my mac to my windows box working? The easier the better, of course. I have seen that there's a program called "Dave", but it's too expensive a solution for my casual printing needs, and the box is a little, well, too touchy-feely old-school "Mac" for me. :)
You can get the GNU-Darwin x86 distribution here, and discuss Darwin x86 here.
the major problem whould be getting the ROM functions to work
for that you actually need a apple ROM you can get Mac On Linux to work so this might be the best place to look
regards
John Jones
Everyone cries about Apple's death if they move to x86, but they could move to x86 chips on a completely proprietary architecture (ala SGI Visual Workstations).
This wouldn't change much for Apple, except them having faster processors.
Err...they did have Rhapsody (Original title for Mac OSX) running on x86, I've seen screenshots from somebody who got hold of a disk image with it which ran in Virtual PC. It was quite interesting; it looked quite like OpenStep with MacOS widgets and finder.
- Were willing to spend the extra money on a G4 tower to gain the ability to upgrade the video card
- Were so committed to their gaming addiction they were willing to buy and install the extra hardware
Apple shocked the users when it subtly announced that 32 megs is "recommended" for optimum performance on Jaguar, but it will run with less. Can anyone give us some non-hyped, non-"Jaguar-freaking-makes-EVERYTHING-better" information about how much of a difference the extra VRAM makes, and what kind of performance the majority of us can expect?But I'm thinking you've already made up your mind.
...now that they got rid of their OS which was awful (for what I needed), and are now OpenBSD, I'm more likely to switch.
Ummm, it's FreeBSD. There's a difference.
I have seen it, and it is really just window dressing as far as I'm concerned. I have heard that the command line stuff is slower now...
Hmmm. Well, it's just window dressing wrapped around a Mach kernel. It has native (I said NATIVE) open technologies, like Java, OpenGL, and the Cocoa API. And for what it's worth, I will stack Apple's API's, written in Objective-C, against Win32 or MFC any day of the week. But then, you've already made up your mind. I'm sure you think that Objective-C is a complete waste of time, but I see the best of C++, Smalltalk, Lisp, and Java in Objective-C. It's beautiful to use. If you have to look up the word "erudite" in the dictionary, you probably don't know what I mean. As far as the command utils being slower, I have been running a developer seed of Jaguar for over a month, and it compares very nicely to earlier versions of OS X. I haven't noticed a slowdown.
Things I care about are price to performance ratio. Ease of programming (tools available - need mySQL, php, Perl, Java, C/C++, etc). Cost of maintenance (software and hardware upgrades), etc etc.
Apple's stuff is hard to steal. So, you're gonna have to pay $129 for an OS. You will need a machine to run it on. You can get an iMac for $800. So, for around $1000, you get a list of features longer than your arm. You get a development tools CD that comes with everything you need for serious development. Java 1.3.1 is pre-installed. The gcc compiler is pre-installed. OS X loves perl. Apache 1.3.1 is pre-installed. Tomcat is a simple download. I develop cross-platform applications for x86, Moto, and SPARC. And I'll even agree with you that programming for the "classic" MacOS was pretty painful. I love OS X, because it is the most efficient development platform that I own, and I'm pretty sure I've tried them all. (I must admit, I do love many things about Visual Studio).
As far as upgrades go, on a G3/G4 tower, just pop the hatch and install your RAID. I did a toolless install of a 512GB RAID two weeks ago. It took ten minutes, literally. The most recent machines use DDR ram, Ultra-ATA drives, AGP4x, PCI. What upgrades do you want?? It comes with gigabit ethernet. It comes with a very nice video card, and many of the towers come "dual-head-ready."
Oh, one more thing. The reason that sliced bread is great is because it's convenient. Someone did the annoying cutting for me. The result is a product that contains less waste and saves me time. Speaking of time, I'm so convinced that you don't care, that I'm not going to waste any more.
After 9 iterations, OS9 was pretty well optimized within the limits of its architecture, and Apple was mainly doing minor tweaks. OSX is a new OS for Apple, and while the basic functionality has been in place, a lot of tweaks and amenities have remained. For example, they are just now adding features like spring-loaded folders, which were present in OS9.
"Only in their dreams can men truly be free 'twas always thus, and always thus will be."
--Tom Schulman
Darwnism at its finest...and you thought Darwin was just a clever open source port name! Ha! Don't believe me? Check out mammals.org! :-)
In terms of development, OS X is a very attractive deal. You don't have to work in C++ unless you want to (which is a good thing, C++ is a shitty language). The OPENSTEP library is one of the most famous in developer history, and it's only gotten better. Developing in Objective-C and the openstep environment is interesting. There is excellent object-archival and object-graph archival (like a more advanced form of java's serialization) that the librarys use to actually story GUI's. They have an elegant visual system for creating GUI's and object networks visually which is quite usefull for getting the View and Controller part of the MVC paradigm done.
Apple has excellent Java support, all the bells and whistles, and a Cocoa-Java bridge. Meaning Objective-C, Java, and Applescript code and interact and use the same object library. Very cool. However, they have not gone to 1.4 just yet. Apple says they'll switch in November/December with the iCal and iSync update (something I am looking forward to).
In terms of maintinence, it's kind of ridiculous. Macs never really need any work. I live in a dusty environment so I blow mine out every now and then. In software, the core system components are kept up-to-date with a nice automated software update package. You can easily use apt-get to get and update new BSD softwate (a project called "fink" at sourceforge).
Apple release security fixes for its core system components (which include OpenSSL and apache) very quickly. The LONGEST that it's ever taken is about three and a half days.
Hardware upgrades are just like a PC. Software upgrades are not really established. Some have been free (10.1). This most recent one cost money ($129 standard/family, $60 student).
In general, Apple has bent over backwards trying to make developers like macs.
Slashdot. It's Not For Common Sense
It was from a regular in the arstechnica forums. Seeing as nobody there didn't believe him, I'd wager they were genuine.
What do you mean by PC's? An Intel compatible chip, or white box hardware? If you mean an Intel compatible chip maybe 2-4 years depending on how the PowerPC line pans out. If you mean white box hardware, then I think you're just trolling.
-BrentAnyone else notice that there are virtually NO aftermarket upgrades available?
I mean sure you can get a Geforce4 4600 or a Radeon 9000 (if you want to spend a lot), but the only ones that I can find require the proprietary 12V connector for the ADC. My Mac doesn't have this.
The only card that I can find is the Radeon 8500. Nice enough card, but $200?!! WTF?!
This same card is about $70 for the PC. Anyone know of a way to get the PC version to run on a Mac? I assume it would require a ROM flash or something...
Any other suggestions?
BTW, I've played with 10.2 at the Apple Store. It rocks. But I'm going to wait for Fink to be upgraded first.
Found this link in Google:
o m/ bloom.html
http://www-i5.informatik.rwth-aachen.de/mbp/blo
You forgot about the return of the 'software base station' functionality. The older technique worked well but requires too much babysitting for general users. There was a petition some time back to reimplement this feature. And here it is. Compared to their competitors, Apple is very responsive to feedback.
As for the rest, if you don't require these features, you've saved yourself some cash. Choice is a wonderful thing.
Given one hour to live, the student replied: "I'd spend it with professor FP who can make an hour seem like a lifetime."
Someone has already pointed out that:
Jag-wahr = Jungle cat.
Jag-yu-ahr = British pronunciation/car
I'll point out that:
Jag-wire = OS X update.
You're not supposed to pronounce it like the cat. There should be no confusion when you *hear* the word. This is not mentioned in any documentation, it's just how Steve pronounces it in keynotes.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
My 400Mhz G3 PowerBook runs 10.1.5 and iPhoto just fine. It does have gobs of RAM. I have noticed that OS X runs slower on older iBooks/iMacs than my same-era PowerBook, though...
Fink is great, and I really appreciate everything that the developers are doing. Same with XDarwin. But major support from Apple (including official "hooks" in the OS where necessary -- eg. a seamless window manager) could make OSX a much more attractive unix platform.
I can imagine Apple's viewpoint: "We would rather support Carbon/Cocoa developers than X developers. X on OSX is kludgy anyhow. Use Aqua."
While this is fine for newbies, many companies are only going to support OSX through X applications (Matlab, VMD and others). That's reality. Apple should work damn hard to improve the user experience with these applications. Not as a top priority, mind you. But some real effort nontheless.
What do other people think?
I think Apple is looking hard at AMD's upcoming 64-bit Hammer CPU. And it seems IBM is also wanting to sell them a 64-bit Power CPU. Apple will never throw away their PC platform just to take up the old 32-bit x86 architecture.
"Only in their dreams can men truly be free 'twas always thus, and always thus will be."
--Tom Schulman
I think that they kind of "snuck" this *major* upgrade on us after the fact. Especially to us "switchers". I'm not very happy that less than a month after I bought a G4 powerbook that I'm told that now to have an up-to-date supported OS I need to shell out full price for a new version. Even on major release updates, most other software vendors have a grace period of when you buy the previous release (a 1-3 months) that you get a low-cost or free upgrade to get the new one. That's good business practice. If you did publicize a new major release coming shortly (which Apple didn't do enough of earlier IMHO), you'd give those who just bought the older release a grace period to get the newer release, otherwise your sales will plummet before the next release with everyone waiting for it rather than buying the shortlived previous release. I'd accept a decent upgrade price as I would expect for other OS's/packages.
Had Apple said earlier that 10.2 was going to be a major release change (that was considered a major release change as opposed to 10.0 to 10.1), or announced it as OS 11 (which doesn't go well with their OSX abbreviation as then it would need to change to OSXI), then I might have held off for another month to get my laptop. I was uninformed and paid the price. That doesn't make me happy.
I was told by Apple support when asking about this that I should have known that something like this would be announced at MacWorld (as I guess the Mac faithful are used to hearing), and that had I known past history of MacWorld announcements, I would have waited. Well, if this practice gets well known, then watch system sales drop even more next year before MacWorld as people wait for announcements then too. I don't think Jobs wants to have to stand up and say that they're last month sales are dropping heavily then will he?
If so, you'll like the networking, power and sleep management in OS X. Location management is excellent. You can have arbitrarily many sets of networking environments, and switching between them takes two mouse clicks, no reboot required.
My 500 MHz iBook's wake from sleep time is two seconds, counting from the time I unlatch the lid. I reboot it only after major OS updates - the last one was July 8th. I have never lost work due to a faliure to wake from sleep.
My battery life in the field is about three hours, mostly running emacs and developing code. I can stop in the middle of anything, close the lid, and walk away confident that I won't lose work. The machine will sleep for about two weeks on a full charge (I lose ~7% battery power per 24 hours).
You can even safely run the battery completely dead - OS X's last gasp is to write the complete state of the machine to the hard drive, and when you find an outlet, plug in and reboot, you come back to exactly where you left off. My kids do this with full-screen games.
To a Lisp hacker, XML is S-expressions in drag.
If the laptop is falling apart, send it back to apple (you did buy apple care didn't you?)
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Granded, the general public should not be used to beta test (ala 10.0.0) especially at $120 a pop...
And yet, Microsoft has become one of the richest companies in the world due in large part to their OS sales; they sell very little hardware.
Man, oh man, this myth has gone on too long. Microsoft has become one of the richest companies in the world due in large part to their OS licensing. Let's all hearken back to the old days of late 1998 / early 1999...
Remember the call for the end of the Microsoft tax? Remember that you still have to pay that tax if you buy a brand name x86 box? Notice that only a week ago, Dell "outsmarted" MS by announcing they will be shipping FreeDOS in the box with the blank PCs. Microsoft didn't make its money by selling their OS exclusively. They made it by being everywhere, making the ubiquitous solution, and licensing with every x86 computer manufacturer there is.
And this rise was made possible by "nobody ever getting fired for buying IBM" in the 70s and early 80s. And then the skyrocket that was the PC Clone market.
They played smart business that turned into bully tactics. And the sheer size of their early success has allowed them to maintain this advantage.
ALL HAIL BRAK!!!
I, and everyone I know, pronounce the jungle cat Jag-wire as well. In fact until they made fun of Steve on TechTV, I'd never heard Jag-wahhr. So I don't think Steve is changing the pronounciation to avoid confustion of an OS with a car, an animal, or a video game system, I think he just comes from roundabouts the same part of the world me and mine do.
Let's say that Apple were to port OS X to commodity PC hardware, and were to make their own high-quality (and likely expensive) well-designed x86 boxes running OS X. If you're not running on an Apple box, don't expect OS X support.
Other than predictable bitching, the first thing that would happen is that Windows would be installed on the box by a number of users who like the hardware, but not the software. The second thing that would happen is that people would likely be able to get OS X running (badly) on cheaper hardware, reducing in the process Apple's reputation for solid and dependable software. This would reduce the user base for OS X software at the same time as Apple's hardware profits are sinking. App developers would flee in droves, and the OS sales would trickle to a halt. In about two or three years, at most, Apple would either be back on PPC (having lost a lot of money) or dead.
-- Two men say they're Jesus. One of them must be wrong. - Dire Straits
I have been using OS X with Fink also and I find it more fun and in manyn ways superior to Linux. OroboOSX helps, ..... I also have the latest and greatest in Gnome, KDE, OpenOffice, etc..... Here we have a pure BSD environment for true *nix users. M$ofties beware! This is not for U.
Rien n'est plus beau que le creux du 0.
While it's not a long term solution, nor do I suggest that it is to be expected from the average user, there IS one way that those of you comfortable with the CLI can often "resolve" the spinning wheel of death. Usually, this "wheel of death" only affects the finder itself. Sometimes other apps will be slowed as well, but 9/10 times they'll respond eventually. With that in mind, the below solution often gets me out of jam with this issue.
/Volumes hierarchy. Depending on which one (ones?) you are dealing with do the following:
/Volumes/
All mounted network volumes (at least appletalk and samba, dunno about DAV) are mounted in the
1. open terminal.app
2. in terminal.app run:
% sudo umount
3. Force Quit / Relaunch the Finder using the interface that pops up when you press cmd-option-esc.
This usually works for me to remove the spinning wheel of death that is mentioned without forcing me to forceably reboot the machine.
-fp
maybe someday I'll be able to buy that mac I've been wanting. just have to keep saving up the pennies I find on the street.
-
The Fortune 500/Global 500 is ranked in terms of revenue. Most people talking about Microsoft as the world's "largest company" are discussing market capitalization.
In stock pricing, it is profits (theoretically), not revenue that allow for dividends which give a stock its value. Therefore, being a huge retailer like Walmart with slim profit margins is less important that having Microsoft's huge profit margins on less revenue.
So give them fake information and come up with something reasonable about which to whine. Trust me, there are many greater issues on my mind than the NYT selling my address to a telemarketer.
There should be a moratorium on the use of the apostrophe.
Max V.
NeXTMail/MIME Mail welcome
you should have looked at the latitude series of laptops from dell. they're comparably priced.
The student asked the master, "Why don't we port our operating system to a newer, faster CPU?"
The master simply replied, "Even the fastest operating system with no software that will run on it makes you wait forever." And the student was enlightened.
--
"Open source is good." - Steve Jobs
"Open source is evil." - Microsoft
Hmmmm... I wonder who else does... could it be... DELL? Compaq and Packard Hell used to be notorious for this, but one is dead and the other was assimilated... by HP, who AFAIK does the same thing.
--
"Open source is good." - Steve Jobs
"Open source is evil." - Microsoft
"pretty but unreliable British automobile"?
Pretentious ford.
Dave
I write a blog now, you should be afraid.
Trust me you want to get a copy even if you don't pay for it... find a "friend" to let you do 'testing' with his/her copy , you will be very pleased with the improved performance. i'm using it now and Id never ever go back to pre 10.2 (yeah yeah that's what i always say about mac updates).
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
They shouldn't of modded you down. He is right.
Keep in mind people that Linux is cheap because development is uh like free. A distro only need to hire packagers and write a few installer scripts to put things together and then add some support staff's. Lets Face it. $50 is not the price of an average os or would a company even break even on a sale at that price. I think we may all be spoiled because of linux.
What apple is offering is really not that bad for amajor upgrade. THe graphics layer had to be rewritten from scratch, smp code had to be re-updated, several apps were added, and I bet apple had to fund some usability testing so they could improve the ui. Its not a 1.2 release but rather a verison 2 release and I think the versioning has confused some people. MacOSX will always stay version 10. If Apple changed to MacOSXI then the OS name would change and confuse consumers. If it were $129 for a bunch of bugfixes (cough cough win98se), then it would be different.
All the other cheaper upgrades so far were minor revisions. ALso if you own version 10.1 or 10.0, you do not have to upgrade. Think about the internals here. System 6, System 7 and System 8, all looked alike from the outside but were totally different inside which made them different releases. Same is here.
http://saveie6.com/
No, it's the OS X users that want a free upgrade
There are quite a few OS X users who are upset that they are going to have to -pay- for an upgrade which will fix many major OS X bugs and or once again support certain features of Apple hardware (ie software WiFi support for OEM Mac antennas) that where disabled with 10.0 or 10.1
OS X 10.0 was by no means a complete OS. And, even though OS X 10.1 was much better, the same could be said for 10.1 as well. I can understand why these people are kind'a ticked off. They want what should've been given to them for free.
"Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
GeForce4 Ti (dual monitor capable) is a BTO option in the online store. I don't keep up with the Radeons, but you can select a Radeon 9000 Pro, if that means anything.
- Scott
Scott Stevenson
Tree House Ideas
Apple has hit their stride in the new OS they're done putting out fires and have been absolutely flying in terms of new development. Basically, they're unshackled from Mac OS 9, now, which makes a huge difference. It blows my mind how much they got done for this release.
- Scott
Scott Stevenson
Tree House Ideas
I don't think you're really looking at any of this closely enough to understand what you're getting. Or maybe Apple isn't communicating it well enough.
Address Book, for example, is not just a simple app. It's a system-level database with public APIs. Quartz Extreme is rather mind-blowing when you see it in action, but at the bear minimum it should make your entire system feel faster, there are tons of improves at the unix level, and polish/speed improvements all around.
You're certainly not alone. Other people seem to say they don't see any need to buy it. But I just don't understand why this is the case. Maybe it's the fact that they called it 10.2. Maybe there aren't enough features that are easy to put into a brochure or web site.
It figures. Apple figures out how to defy software engineer physics, and ship an aggressive project on time -- the public's response is "what, already? I don't want to pay yet."
- Scott
Scott Stevenson
Tree House Ideas
Comparing Apple prices to Dell (the number 1 PC maker in the world) it becomes immediately clear that except for two configurations of the "Dimensions" line, Macs are significantly cheaper (by $496 to $2085) than comparably configured Dells. If anyone is doing the raping, it's Dell, and it made them the largest computer maker in the world!
Synchronizing the systems:
Comparably priced speakers were added to the Mac, Precision 530 and Precision 340 systems so that all would have the same configuration as the Dell Dimension systems. ( which automatically come with speakers )
Optical Logitech mice were added to all Dell systems to match the Mac which ships with an optical mouse.
V.90 modem cards were added to all Dell systems to match the Mac which automatically ships with an internal modem.
3 Year AppleCare Protection Plan was added to Mac configurations to match the standard 3 year Dell protection plan.
All other user configurable hardware ( except processors ) were selected to match point for point between the Macs and the Dells.
Where possible, optional add-on software ( such as virus protection, Office Suites etc... ) has been excluded to acheive a more accurate comparison.
None of the systems were priced with monitors.
Apple Power Mac G4 ( tower, dual Processor )
Mac OS 10.2 ( Juaguar ) 2 GB PC2700 DDR SDRAM
120 GB Ultra ATA drive
SuperDrive
NVIDIA GeForce4 Titanium
56K internal modem
Standard keyboard
Apple 1 button optical mouse
Apple Pro Speakers ( $59 )
3 Year AppleCare Protection Plan
$3,757 ( Dual 867 MHz PowerPC G4 )
$5,057 ( Dual 1.25 GHz PowerPC G4 )
Dell Precision 530 series ( tower, dual Processor )
Microsoft Windows XP Professional
2 GB PC800 ECC RDRAM
120 GB 7200RPM IDE Drive
DVD+RW+R Combo Drive
nVidia, Quadro4 900XGL, 128MB, VGA/DVI
V.90 PCI Data/Fax Controllerless Modem
Standard Keyboard
Logitech 2 Button optical mouse
Harman Kardon HK-395 Speakers ( $49 )
3 Year Parts + Onsite Labor
$5,593 ( Dual 1.8 GHz Xeon ) - $1,836 more than low end dual Mac
$7,142 ( Dual 2.4 GHz Xeon ) - $2,085 more than high end dual Mac
Dell Precision 340 series ( tower, single Processor )
Microsoft Windows XP Professional
2 GB PC800 ECC RDRAM
120 GB 7200RPM IDE Drive
DVD+RW+R Combo Drive
nVidia, Quadro4 900XGL, 128MB, VGA/DVI
V.90 PCI Data/Fax Controllerless Modem
Standard Keyboard
Logitech 2 Button optical mouse
Harman Kardon HK-395 Speakers ( $49 )
3 Year Parts + Onsite Labor
$4,754 ( 1.7 GHz Pentium 4 ) - $997 more than low end dual Mac
$5,553 ( 2.53 GHz Pentium 4 ) - $496 more than high end dual Mac
Dell Dimension 8200 series ( mini-tower, single processor )
Microsoft Windows XP Professional
2 GB PC800 ECC RDRAM
120 GB 7200RPM IDE Drive
DVD+RW+R Combo Drive
nVidia, Quadro4 900XGL, 128MB, VGA/DVI
V.90 PCI Data/Fax Controllerless Modem
Standard Keyboard
Logitech 2 Button optical mouse
Harman Kardon HK-395 Speakers ( included )
3 Year Parts + Onsite Labor
$3,526 ( Single 2.0 GHz Pentium 4 ) - $231 less than low end dual Mac
$3,886 ( Single 2.53 GHz Pentium 4 ) - $1,171 less than high end dual Mac
If OSX ever did run x86 then you would only need VMWare or something of that sort to get to Windows and Windows apps. Alternately you could run Windows or Linux as the base OS and then run OSX in VMWare.
Lasers Controlled Games!
Its on a Yugo right now. More like it would be on a Ferrari if ported to x86.
:)
Hmmmm. The current towers are not that shabby (Yugo) when it comes to performance! More like BMW (nice human interface and more than adequate performance) vv Ferrari (a car built with cheap ass Fiat components and a kick-ass engine).
Maybe in a year or so Apple will leapfrog x86 - if the rumours about the IBM POWER4-lite are true... Then it would be x86 Ferrari road car against POWER4 Ferrari F1 car
--
Reverse outsourcing: it's the future
www.apple.com/imac
Mac OS, Windows and Unix, all in one box, without paying an arm and a leg, and it looks damn cool too. Believe me, M$ is scared, but they're also secure in their position in the x86 market because manufacturers will not preinstall anything but windows and average joe doesn't touch mac OS ("macs? arent' those the crappy things we hear about? why would we want to run their system when we've got windows?
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
1. Windows should be completely vectorized. This is faster to load than bitmaps, takes up less RAM, and less hard-drive space.
2. One should have the option to turn off all of the fancy features of Aqua -- i.e., shiny effects, transparency, animation. Why? Firstly, many find these features tacky. Secondly, they serve little or no function. Thirdly, to speed things up. Transferring the rendering of the GUI to the GPU is better than letting the CPU do it (note to X-windows WM developers, hint hint), but it requires many users to needlessly upgrade their GPU when they wouldn't have to otherwise. Thus, one should be able to turn off these resource-hogging features.
3. Minimization/maximization. Windows should minimize to their appicon on the dock, and hold clicking on that appicon should bring up a pop-up menu of the instances of it running. Dragging the appicon of a running application off the dock should quit that application, while dragging an instance of it off the apicons menu should close that instance. After the app's closed, dragging the apicon off the dock again should remove it from the dock, if it was a permanent member. Maximization should maximize to the entire screen.
4. Bring back Apple menu, with all the nifty menus. The old apple menu was great -- had applications, control panel, and many other useful menus. The new one should get those features back. Btw, control panel options should be entirely accessible through menuing: why make us open up a whole new window?
5. Keyboard control. Apple has long had issues with keyboard control -- namely, that you can't do everything you want from the keyboard. I suggest a very simple and traditional fix: F1 opens up File, F2 opens up Edit, F3 opens up View, and so on and so forth; in other words, they F# opens up the #th menu item.
6. Scroll bar buttons. Up/down scroll bar buttons should be available at the top and bottom of a scroll bar column.
7. For other things which Apple should integrate into their WM (as should every WM), see this site.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
I went into System Preferences, Sharing, and checked the box for Printer Sharing. I then used nmap to find that this opened port 631, cups. So, I installed cups on my Linux box, launched cupsd, and pointed Mozilla to http://localhost:631/ per the documentation. I was surprised to see that my Linux box had already found my USB printer connected to my eMac on the LAN. Very impressive!
/var/log/cups/error_log:
Now comes the not-so-impressive part. It doesn't actually print. Test pages show up under "completed jobs" as "cancelled". This happens regardless of whether I try to print from the Linux box or from the eMac (although I can print from OSX applications just fine), so I'm assuming the Linux side of this setup is working perfectly.
I found this in
E [21/Aug/2002:21:36:48 -0700] Unable to convert file 0 to printable format for job 7!
The documentation on cups.org says this is often caused by not having ghostscript installed. I wouldn't expect that to be the issue, since all this stuff came preinstalled and preconfigured by Apple and all I did was check the box. Does anyone have any ideas?
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
With previous versions of OSX, Apple basically sold people a very raw and unfinished product, with many bugs.
The problems fixed by 10.2 are things which shouldn't have been problems in an OS you spent $129 USD for.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
If MacOS were available for a lot of platforms, it wouldn't work as well as MacOS. I seriously doubt that it's even possible to create a truly reliable OS for an uncontrolled hardware base. Macs work like Macs, you plug stuff in and it just magically starts to function. If they ported to x86 and the 1x10^9 bits of associated hardware, they could no longer insure that this would be true. At that point, they're just a smaller Microsoft with better art school grads. Sticking to propriatary hardware allows Apple to avoid price wars (PC hardware is a virtually profit free industry) and make better products. They might sell a bit more software by porting to x86, but they'd lose every competitive edge they have. This is why SJ quickly killed off the clone makers. This is why the iPod has no documented support on non-Mac platforms. If Apple changed their strategy, Macs would no longer Just Work (TM) and they'd be just as unpredictable and idiot unfriendly as all other computers.
In Capitalist America, bank robs you!
makes as much sense as telling Bill Gates to concentrate on selling applications and stop mucking about with that silly Windows stuff.
While Windows dominance is a major part of MS strategy, my understanding is that it is the applications that really bring in the cash for MS--specifically Office and the server apps.
Methinks Apple and MS long ago reached a mutual understanding: Apple will stay out of the x86 pool and MS will produce decent Mac software. (For that matter, how tied are XP and 2K to the x86 platform? What would it take to port them to Apple hardware?)
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Finaly, someone besides me is doing research!!!!!
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Pardon me, but Bull Shit. How much money do you plan on spending on computer upgrades for the next 2 years? And when those 2 or 3 years comes to a close, how much will you spend on a new PC? Add all that money up and you realize you could have bought a mac and kept it useable and upgraded for 5 years and have enough money to buy a new one because you saved money that you would have spent upgrading.
And yes, Apple is a niche market, but so is SUN. And guess what, for the most part we like being a niche market. We don't have to worry about morons and trolls representing us (though some Zealots are almost worse) and we enjoy high returns on our investments. And Apple gets a nice chunk of change and doesn't crumble when the economy experiences a downturn.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
It's hating the bullshit ones.
CIP, Multibutton mice. If you are a PC user, and have purchased a computer in the past 3 years. Most likely it has a USB mouse. When you buy your mac, plug in the PC mouse. It's not like you'll want to use the PC again anytime soon. And even if you do, unplug and switcvh (without powering down the mac, and hopefuly without powering down the PC, or just buy a $3 discount mouse for the PC
If you have valid complaints, by all means, bring them up, but when someone helps you don't come back with a "well... uh... um.. it's still too pricey and it's not like my box" because that isn't a valid complaint
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
In fact, I'll even go a step further. I would run the MacOS tommorrow if I didn't have to pay through my nose to do it
Great! Then prepare to switch next time you upgrade your computer.
Since Apple hardware has been consistently cheaper and faster when compared to quality Intel machines, then when you're ready to retire the computer you've got now, make the switch. It will cost you less and you'll get more.
Of course, there are trolls who think a 2GHz processor is twice as fast as a 1GHz processor (talk about marketing suckers!) but we both know that performance is more than that, and the PowerPC architecture and apple hardware, has it in spades.
So, welcome to the Mac family.
Yeah, and you guys panned the ipod too: http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23
It doesn't show up until you plug in a Wacom tablet. You may also need to install Wacom's driver, but I'm not sure about that. I know Ink shows up in System Preferences after you plug in your tablet, though.
Win XP doesn't crash. However, it does begin getting quirky. Sometimes, with many windows open, it will take 5 seconds to respond to a keystroke. Sometimes, it will stop responding to mouse clicks, or be very slow. It doesn't exactly crash, but it is necessary to reboot to get full functionality back again.
Does anyone else think it a bit disturbing that the New York Times' review of OS 10.2 is written by David Pogue? His effusive review of "the best-looking, least-intrusive and most thoughtfully designed operating system walking the earth today" only mentions one feature flaw - the lack of an adequate online help system.
And there's the strange thing -- for what do we think that a reader of this review would do? Well, how about buy the software, but also look for a good book to replace the online manual? And there's where David Pogue's own "Mac OS X: The Missing Manual" comes in. Described by Tim O'Reilly as the fastest seller in O'Reilly's history since 1994, Mr. Pogue's review would seem to have precisely the effect of increasing his own net worth.
Mass media may not have the credibility that it used to, but surely we should expect at least a disclaimer from an institution with the reputation of the New York Times?
Is e an ceol is fearr liom na jazz
Thanks for that.... but (un)fortunately they are using Webobjects, so each URI is unique per visitor and is linked to a unique session
so the parent comment was correct, they don't like deep linking
----- One piece short of Legoland
The truth is that 'just working' is mostly a function of whether or not you use a PC-type BIOS or you go for Open Firmware. If Intel and Microsoft came out and said that their next PC hardware reference platform included open firmware, the IRQ hassle would go away and MS could actually make very good plug and play support for Windows.
Shame they don't do it but they're deathly afraid of innovating here because of the legacy problem.
Nope, that URL doesn't work....
possibly, just maybe... its because...
"(the Apple Store doesn't like deep linking)"
---
Live Long & Prosper \\//_
CYA STUX =`B^) 'da Captain,
Jedi & Last *-fytr
It's a good thing that Apple will be able to get IBM Power4lite chips soon. Motorola is a dog, true but it's not the only possible supplier of PPC chips. IBM's got a very valuable Power4 franchise and the volume off of their own RS/6000 machines will make PPC a priority for them for the indefinite future.
Here's a few more scenario's for Mac superiority
Biotech desktop running BLAST (Altivec makes BLAST much faster than x86 variants)
Getting a computer for mom, dad, and the grandparents
Running a file and print server cheaply with no not very savvy IT support and without pirating.
I'm sure there are lots of others.
1. Spring-loaded folders. I find them indispensible.
2. A return of old-style "Find Files." No longer are you forced to use Sherlock.
3. As the journalists have been spouting, there are a number of optimizations that both make OS X faster and make OS X seem faster. Also, the interface has been cleaned up a bit; some people might complain that it's a bit more utilitarian than the "classic" Aqua look-and-feel, but it's still nice.
Now, if only I could find a decent TWAIN driver for my Epson Perfection 1640SU that worked with Photoshop 7. Yes, I know there's both the Epson Scan-To-File utility and the TWAIN driver, but it doesn't work--yet. For that reason (and the fact that USB support under Classic seems to be broken *again*) I won't use OS X 10.2 at this time . . . leaving me with 9.2.2 *sigh*
Stating on Slashdot that I like cheese since 1997.
They're trying to move all configuration files to XML so everything can get managed with one simple tool. Now *that's* something that advances the state of Unix and workalikes. I believe NetInfo is also available in Darwin so the source is available for reimplementation elsewhere.
http://clustermonkey.org/~laz/pbook/rob.lmbench.tx t
The point is further irrelevant seeing as the ACPI standards are around which allow for extensive IRQ sharing etc. IRQ's haven't really been a problem since the days of ISA, and the early days of PnP ISA.
I'm a "switcher" and this is what I've seen so far: No upgarde price (even MS offers that) and moving from free iDisk to $100/year. I can understand charging something for iDisk, but $100 (not taking into account the $50 upgrade price (which is at least somewhat reasonable))?? Apple went from being "the cool company" to the "how else could we possibly gouge our customers? company"
psxndc
The emacs religion: to be saved, control excess.
-Pat
OK, so you admit that your evidence that Mac OS X is slow comes from reviews and statements, not first-hand experience.
My first-hand experience with Mac OS X was that there were two areas where the OS was slow, and that was Quartz and Classic mode. Mac OS X.2 goes a long way in speeding up Quartz, and the Classic issue will resolve itself as more and more programs/devices are designed for the newer OS. As most reviews concentrated on those two areas that I mentioned, I think your basis is not solid.
What I have noticed, though, is that various elements of the OS actually make work on the computer faster, either through intuitive placement of the controls or through the fact that it works the way I want to work (instead of the other way around).
The Darwin underpinnings have ben updated as well, and the developer tools encourage better, streamlined programming (I'm always amazed at how cruft swallows processing speed!).
Oh, and as for Apple and the technical reasons: you can find them at the Apple Developer Connection website, as well as at Apple's World Wide Developer's Conference. Ever since Apple caused mass drowsiness with its explanation of the "Megahrtz Myth", they've been careful to keep the boring techie stuff on the sidelines.
I appreciate the fact that you have way more experience with the guts of an OS than I do, but I would appreciate it if you would test the OS first-hand before telling me how slow it is.
Yet the product itself is crap. You haven't the slightest idea about what makes a good end product, but damn if you're not good at putting together & maintaining the guts of it.
So what do you do?
You seek out similar projects, and model your end result after theirs.
So what's wrong with this picture?
Absolutely nothing, if you're content to lead a life of mediocracy. You don't take the wheel and turn it into a hoverboard. You just find new (and occasionally, innovative) ways of polishing the wheel, improving it's traction, and longevity. You leave the real innovation to the people in the large corporations. Your number one and two excuses: time and money. You don't have alot of each, so you don't even bother.
Sound familiar?
I don't really give two flying fucks about Linux on the desktop. BUT, if Miguel Iglecias & the KDE team want to really make an impact, they should start doing what these big companies do: through UI design and analysis. This means:
There's no reason any GUI/WM team has to go chase the big companies who have already done all this, and more. It simply turns them into "me too's", and does little to really advance their cause. Sure, each iteration will look slightly prettier than the last, but they'll all look like something else -- and that's not innovation... that's just tinkering.
Symptom
1. Some computers that appear in the Chooser do not appear in the Connect to Server dialog.
2. The following message appears in an alert box when you attempt to use the Chooser in the Classic environment: "The AppleShare server you are trying to connect to appears not to support the IP protocol required by Mac OS X. Check with the server's administrator if a 'Server IP Address' is available."
Products affected
Mac OS X 10.0 to 10.0.4
Mac OS 9.0 and later
Mac OS 8.6 and earlier
AppleShare IP 5.0 and later
AppleShare IP 6.0 and later
Windows NT Services for Macintosh
Any other third-party server that offers AppleShare (AFP) over AppleTalk only
Solution
Update to Mac OS X 10.1, which can connect to AppleShare over the AppleTalk protocol. The following section is useful if you do not yet have the Mac OS X 10.1 Update. It may also provide you with useful background information.
Connecting in Mac OS X 10.0 to 10.0.4
Mac OS X versions 10.0 to 10.0.4 only connect to AppleShare volumes over the TCP/IP protocol. Mac OS 8.6 and earlier, as well as some third-party server products, only offer AppleShare over the AppleTalk protocol. Since Mac OS X cannot connect to them, you can reverse the sharing relationship as a workaround: Set up File Sharing on the Mac OS X computer and then connect from the Chooser of the AppleTalk-only computer. Using this method, you can still copy files between the computers. Alternatively, you can update the earlier operating system to Mac OS 9 or later to achieve true bidirectional sharing.
Mac OS 9 and certain versions of AppleShare IP do not share over TCP/IP by default, so you must select this option. The following sections can help you do this or perform the workaround.
So then.... why doesn't Microsoft do what all the "OS X on x86" folks want Apple to do?
Let MS devote all of their energies to Office and the like and commoditize Windows by open sourcing it and turning it over to the geeks. That way Windows could be run on many more platforms (remember when "cross platform" meant it would run on Alpha, PPC and x86? Now for MS "cross platform" means it'll run under ME/2000/NT) Open sourcing Windows would also get a lot more eyes on fixing security flaws, stability problems and other issues that haven't popped up yet. These arguements are moot because the phrase "snowball's chance in hell" comes to mind when the subject of open sourcing Windows is broached. The same is true of expecting Apple to make OS X available on platforms other than PPC/whatever Apple comes up with in the future. It just ain't gonna happen folks.
Have a look at my NeXTstation Turbo Color.
68040 @ 33MHz, 128MB RAM, 2GB HD, 21" color screen
Fast, fast, fast -- no lie.
blakespot
-- Heisenberg may have slept here.
iPod Hacks.com
Unless the early days of ISA and PnP ISA include last year, there are still ocassional problems. Pulling a card, restarting, and then reseating a card to get it recognized should have no place in a modern operating system environment. That was on a Win2K system which was a sealed box with an extended warranty so it had to go into the shop to do it.
Quartz anti-aliasing, not just anti-aliasing in general. The Mac's had it before Windows. Quartz anti-aliasing is just better (than the Mac's old anti-aliasing system, as well as any others out there that I've seen).
And don't get me started on anti-aliasing in X. Sucks like Dick Cheney on an oxygen tank after a walk around the block.
Actually, no, the major change from Sherlock 2 to Sherlock 3 was the integration of functionality from the shareware program Watson, which everyone who's used it agrees is an amazing time-saver (and it's unlike anything I've seen anywhere else, for whatever that's worth).
A) Any student who pays tuition at a major university has an internet2 connection. And you can bet that 99% of them are not running *BSD (except those running OSX).
B) Anyone who wants to can tunnel to IPv6; there are plenty of public gateways.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
Aside from IDE, pretty much every technology found in both Macs and Wintels was first implemented in Macs.
Correct me if I'm wrong on any of these, but I believe the PCI bus was first used in PC's, SDRAM, DDR RAM, you mentioned IDE, AGP, Nvidia and ATI cards used in said buses, etc. (Not saying these were all invented on x86, just that they came to the x86 platform before they came to mac).
I'm not generally in favor of the government regulating speech, but moronic statements like that have become so commonplace that I'm actually in support of the FTC's recent hints at forcing computer vendors to use comparable numbers when reporting speed.
Yes, yes, we all know about the Megahertz myth, and yes I've taken several architecture classes so I think I have an inkling of what I'm talking about. Show me ANY benchmark ANYWHERE that shows a 1GHz G4 beating a say, 2.5GHz P4. I'm afraid even your altivec benchmarks don't even give that great an edge any more since the addition of SSE2. Please do back up your statements.
I don't know what to say. We could sit here and trade anecdotal evidence back and forth, but this type of discussion clearly has no conclusion. Safe to say that this discussion should go no further I think.
The iBook isn't available with the Mobility Radeon 7500 (comparable to a GF4 Go), it comes with the Mobility Radeon, which is comparable to a GF2 Go. The Mobility Radeon 7500 does come with the Powerbook, but those start at $2500.
I'm typing this on a Sony VAIO laptop with a Radeon 7500 which was ~$1700 at Fry's Electronics.
"It take 9 months to bear a child, no matter how many women you assign to the job."
I realize this discussion is about the kernel, but I don't have time to download the FreeBSD or Darwin source right now... however, I do have a MacOS X 10.1.5 install here, and here are some possibly-interesting stats:
[greyfox:~] root# uname -a /bin/* /sbin/* /usr/bin/* /usr/sbin/* | wc -l /bin/* /sbin/* /usr/bin/* /usr/sbin/* | wc -l /bin/* /sbin/* /usr/bin/* /usr/sbin/* | wc -l /mach_kernel | grep BSD
Darwin greyfox.azeotrope.org 5.5 Darwin Kernel Version 5.5: Thu May 30 14:51:26 PDT 2002; root:xnu/xnu-201.42.3.obj~1/RELEASE_PPC Power Macintosh powerpc
[greyfox:~] root# grep -l FreeBSD
14
[greyfox:~] root# grep -l NetBSD
133
[greyfox:~] root# grep -l OpenBSD
24
[greyfox:~] root# strings
setconf: IOFindBSDRoot returned an error (%d);setting rootdevice to 'sd0a'.
BSD Name
IOKitBSDInit
IOBSD
BSD Major
BSD Minor
BSD root: %s
BSD Component Version 5.5:
In other words, the kernel itself has no $*BSD$ RCS ID strings in it at all. And of the binaries that come with the system, a large majority are actually from NetBSD, with OpenBSD second and FreeBSD last. As an example, these are the RCS ID strings in /bin/ls:
/bin/ps is from FreeBSD though:Off the top of my head, you're right on those. Fortunately, I said "pretty much" and those are a tiny minority of the significant technologies involved in the machine.
This statement shows a lack of understanding computer internals. Basically, other than the cpu and BIOS, Macs and PC's are basically indistinguishable today. The chip is of course a MAJOR part of the computer, but if we're talking peripheral "component" tech, then your statements are absolutely not true.
You then go on to say that:
My issue was with the statement that implied direct comparability between clock speeds on different processor models. Such is charlatanry.
And for recollections sake, here is my quote to which you replied:
And hell, with the massive speed gap you have between the highend G4's (what, 1GHz top?) and high-end P4's (what, 2.8GHz now?) the x86 platform is clearly superior in terms of speed.
How could you POSSIBLY think I was saying to compare each MHz processors?? For one I was talking P4's which don't even have 1GHz models (AFAIK), so such a comparison would be impossible.
There's no doubt that Mhz-for-Mhz the G4 can outperform the P4 at some things (note the SOME things). But when the best g4 you can compare is 1GHz, and the best P4 2.8GHz, it's not going to be a close call. Such is reality, as unfortunate as it is.
Why would anyone want to run Win 2k on Mac hardware? If you've already spent the $1000+ for a Mac, why not run the best OS out there on it? All of the arguments for x86 OS X work in revernse: why would people buy a big Mac when a $300 PC can run the OS? (I don't necessarily believe all of those arguments, but they apply here.)
There should be a moratorium on the use of the apostrophe.
Max V.
NeXTMail/MIME Mail welcome
This is an almost completely different OS, and it is PHENOMENAL. I can't describe how striking all the new features are, from Rendevous, to Inkwell, to the system-wide functionality of the Address Book, bluetooth, sherlock 3, the raw SPEED of this OS ... this is an amazing accomplishment, and OS X has finally matured. THIS is the OS people will be dying to switch for.
It runs EXCEPTIONALLY well, even on old hardware. My old beige G3 that I built from parts is ASTOUNDINGLY FAST under 10.2!! Even with 6MB of VRAM on a crappy RagePro, this OS is gorgeous, fluid, and incredibly pleasing.
Go to your local apple store and check it out for yourself!
Actually, I know they are faster because I know the architectures, the science, the physics and because I have done my own tests.
Not only are they faster, but when you buy Apple hardware you get it for less money than a comparable PC.
But I don't expect that to sway you-- this has been the case for most of the last decade: Macs are cheaper and faster than quality PCs (any computer that doesn't last a year isn't worth buying or comparing to.) So, either you know it by now, or you're keeping faith in your religious convictions despite objective reality.
Yeah, and you guys panned the ipod too: http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23
I agree. Objective-C does have some nice features.
But, still, some of the most powerful tools in Lisp are things like the closure of having data and code use the same representation and the wonderful things that lets you do, such as the Lisp defmacro system.
CLOS with is dynamic multiple-dispatch (read generics) with user-definable method-combinations.
I'll repeat defmacro again because it's the real reason that Lisp lets you do really really good bottom-up programming as well as the standard top-down approach, instead of the pure top-down approach that obj-c and c++ make you use. I mean, good luck writing one of those (with-... (code)) macros in Obj-C.
User-defined methods being indistinguishable from regular keywords is also part of making bottom-up programming possible and more powerful.
True dynamic typing of ALL types, not this obj-c 'id' thing where only class pointers are dynamically typed.
You mentioned scheme. So, what about call/cc (call-with-current-continuation) which lets you "unroll" and take parts of code and rip them "inside-out" to make them easier to use and understand.
What about the fact that an incredibly powerful OO system like CLOS can be built on top of Lisp, at run-time, using nothing but Lisp code.
I don't think Obj-C or any other language of that style will ever come close to the pure flexibility of Lisp.
I'll grant you that Obj-C has some nice features. But the "best" of Lisp I still have to take issue with.
Justin Dubs